Women’s tennis takes on ITAs

Last weekend, the women’s tennis team traveled to one of the most important individual tournmanets of the fall.

The USTA/ITA New England Women’s Tennis Regional was hosted at Middlebury this past weekend, where the women’s tennis team fell short of the finals in both the singles and doubles brackets. Seventeen Div. III tennis programs were represented in the tournament, which spanned three days.

The Ephs had six singles players in the tournament and four doubles teams. The first day of the tournament, Friday, began with Linda Shin ’17, the No. 5 seed, besting her Wheaton opponent 6-0, 6-0. Julia Cancio ’18 and Mia Gancayco ’18 also secured a victory each at 6-1, 6-1 and 6-0, 6-1, respectively, to advance to the second round. All three went on to overcome their opponents in the round of 32, advancing to the round of 16 on Saturday.

Korina Neveaux ’19, Leah Bush ’19 and Alex Stone ’16 all played great tennis before losing hard-fought matches in the first round.

In doubles, Cancio and Bush, seeded No. 8, started things off with an 8-1 victory over Salve Regina before going on to an 8-3 victory in the next round that secured them a spot in the quarterfinals. Stone and Carmen Saab ’19 defeated their Trinity opponents 8-4 before falling to the number one seed in the round of 16. The remaining two Ephs doubles fell in tough matches in the first round.

Saturday began with four Ephs remaining in the tournament. Shin, Cancio and Gancayco all played in singles matches in the round of 16 while Cancio and Bush confidently progressed to the doubles quarterfinals.

Shin continued her success against her Tufts opponent in the round of 16, emerging victorious with a score of 6-3,6-0 to advance to the quarterfinals for her third-straight year. She was matched up against Bowdoin’s Tess Trinka who defeated Bush in a tiebreaker on day one. Shin downed Trinka with a score of 6-0, 6-2 to secure herself a spot in the semifinals. Cancio defeated her Amherst opponent and Gancayco overcame Bowdoin’s Joulia Likhainsaka, though both fell in close matches in the quarterfinals.

The remaining doubles team of Cancio and Bush were paired in the quarterfinals against a Wesleyan doubles team and eventually fell 8-5.

On Sunday, Shin, the only Eph to make it to the final day of the three-day competition, eventually fell to the tournament’s No. 1 seed 6-1, 6-2.

“This weekend gave us great match experience because it was an individual tournament,” co-captain Maya Hart ’16 said. “We had a great showing, including Julia Cancio and Mia [Gancayo] making it to the quarters and Linda [Shin] reaching the semis. It was great for everyone to have an opportunity to play a bunch of matches. We are really looking forward to our next dual match this weekend against Amherst.”

This Saturday, the women host archrival Amherst at 1 p.m. at the Torrence Hunt Tennis Center.